Istanbul Photo Awards

Istanbul Photo Awards is an international news photography contest organized by Anadolu Agency. The contest aims to contribute to the sphere of news photography and offers a perspective shaped by the region’s unique position at the center of diverse cultures. The awards reward endeavors of courageous and talented photojournalists from around the world on merit.

Istanbul Photo Awards 2018 Winners

Leaves cover the eyes of 11-month-old Rohingya refugee Abdul Aziz. His body was brought back to the family shelter at Balukhali refugee camp near Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, a few hours after he died on Dec. 4, 2017. Abdul Aziz, whose family fled Myanmar two months ago, died at a local clinic after suffering from high fever and severe cough for 10 days, his mother said.

More than 600,000 Rohingya refugees have been forced to flee to Bangladesh following an offensive by Myanmar’s military. United Nations has called events as “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing”. Hundreds of refugees are known to have died while trying to escape while survivors keep arriving with horrifying memories. What the Rohingya refugees flee to is a different kind of suffering in sprawling makeshift camps rife with fears of malnutrition, cholera, and other diseases.

Alexey is on his way to the training session in the swimming pool. He uses a wheelchair with the help of his companions. The story of Alexey Talai begins with an old ammunition from the Second World War that exploded near him many years later, leaving him without legs and hands. Years later, Alexey became a member of the Paralympic national team of Belarus.

Vehicles are moved to an old bus terminal, the highest ground in Pekan Rantau Panjang on Jan. 4, 2017. Floods have affected almost all states of Malaysia, with thousands of people evacuated to relief centers.

Palm trees burn in Ventura in California on Dec. 5, 2017. The wildfires have burned more than 1.5 million acres of land across the Golden State. Thousands of families were forced to rebuild their homes and dozens of people have died.

Omayma, 21, from Morocco, photographed in international waters midway between Libya and Italy. She remembers one of the last conversations she had with her mother: ‘I asked her for money for the journey and promised that I’d return after I’d educated myself. She was worried I’d die.’

The portrait of Fedya. Five years ago, Nadya, 32, adopted Fedya, 16, from a nursing home where she was a volunteer. Fedya has several neurological diseases, including autism and the mild form of cerebral palsy.